A code repository is typically a searchable, categorized, and/or internet accessible location that users may access to browse, search and download source or compiled library code. Uses of code repositories may include open source projects, proprietary development projects, and/or projects that create libraries for later use. A code annotation is a special form of syntactic metadata that can be added to source code. Classes, methods, variables, parameters, and/or code packages may be annotated. Unlike comments, annotations may be actionable in that they may be embedded in files generated by a compiler, and may be utilized by an execution environment to be retrievable at run-time.
Challenges may exist however, when program code files need to be searched (e.g., to find a source and/or solution to a coding problem/error). Specifically, it is presently difficult to efficiently and/or accurately search for specific methods and/or libraries across a set of code repositories from within an IDE.